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Via Small Wars Journal, some bad news from the Afghanistan Study Group:

Afghanistan stands today at a crossroads. The progress achieved after six years of international engagement is under serious threat from resurgent violence, weakening international resolve, mounting regional challenges and a growing lack of confidence on the part of the Afghan people about the future direction of their country. The United States and the international community have tried to win the struggle in Afghanistan with too few military forces and insufficient economic aid, and without a clear and consistent comprehensive strategy to fill the power vacuum.

It is possible, I think, that Afghanistan will always look like a failed state from a Western point of view; that the forces of geography, warlordism and tribalism have and will continue to conspire to make governing that territory in a "modern" manner virtually impossible.

But here's the point: It's our own fault we don't know -- and might not ever know -- if something different, more stable and less dangerous to America is possible. Because in invading Iraq, we took our eye off the ball.

I won't get into all the reasons why invading Iraq was a bad idea. And it is certainly true that NATO maybe hasn't been the most reliable partner in Afghanistan. But absent a second attack on America, we never should have been at the point where the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff is saying things like this:

"In Afghanistan, we do what we can," said Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "In Iraq, we do what we must."

We we must do has only been barely adequate, at best, in Iraq. What we can do in Afghanistan has been less than adequate, clearly. And because of our choices, the world is a little more dangerous.